Should you MOT a car BEFORE or AFTER a full service?

Do you agree with this mechanic from the West Midlands?

Should you MOT a car BEFORE or AFTER a full service?
Photo: Bigstock

It’s a question often asked by motorists: should you MOT a car before or after a service? Well, an MOT tester from Walsall Wood Service has taken to TikTok to deliver, what he says, is the right answer.

Mechanic Craig says a customer should get their car tested BEFORE forking out for a full service.

The TikTok clip was made in response to a comment from Phill, which said: “My biggest annoyance is when I pay for a full service and MOT and they do the MOT first and act all surprised that something was wrong…”

Craig says a ‘caring garage’ will do the MOT first.

He continues: “Why do we MOT the car first? In today’s society, life is expensive, and not everybody can afford to pay for a mass of MOT failures and a service as well.

“So should a car fail an MOT, the customer is given the option to carry out the repairs and skip the service for now, or postpone the service, so that they can save money on that initial visit.

“By doing the service first they’ve already completed a big chunk of that bill that you’re gonna get, and they’re now giving you an even bigger one to tell you all the things it’s about to fail its MOT on.”

“Unlike a service, an MOT is a legal requirement for you to drive that vehicle on the road, so you’re now absolutely stuck; you’ve just paid £300 and you still can’t drive your car on the road because it’s about to fail the MOT.

“Always a good idea when doing an MOT and a service to MOT the car first so that you can give the customer the best value for money and the opportunity to save money where they can.”

Not everyone who commented on the clip agrees with Craig’s advice, but what do you think? Leave a comment below.

Source: The Sun

23 Comments

  1. I totally agree been doing this system for 20yrs now

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    • I agree it should be mot first been doing g this for over forty years and saved a fortune for customers by doing this method

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  2. I work in a very busy garage and run 3 MOT lanes. We always recommend to carry out the MOT 1st, then depending on the outcome and cost, will either take care away and delay service or will ask us to do the repairs with the service.

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  3. I agree with Craigs’s reasoning but there is also another reason for Mot’ing first.
    Doing the Mot first gives DVSA the data it requires to adapt and change the mot based on the condition of vehicles at the time of the test. For example, if every vehicle was failing on a particular item then the mot routine could be adapted to make sure that every tester knew.
    If vehicles were serviced first, this data would be lost !

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    • Totally agree with this!

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  4. I agree with Craig

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  5. I agree completely

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  6. I totally agree with Craig.It seems them that know understand and them that don’t never will.

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    • With me cars must go to pass. I have not got time to keep going back and forth for retests. I do not charge for our time when taking cars to and from MOT and it’s about an hour. I will therefore not take cars in unless we have looked after them and have seen them beforehand and have done everything we say needs doing. If the customer does not like it then they can walk

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  7. You should also look at the MOT results; if everybody had a service prior to an MOT and all the repairs were carried out, the Government would have all the statistical evidence they needed to go to 4.2.2 or even scrap the MOT altogether.

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  8. We will always do the MOT first if at all possible, or ,if not able to, give the car a quick once over to spot any major concerns before starting the service so the customer doesn’t get a shock and has the choice of what to do.

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  9. I totally disagree, Not saying you should service the car but it should be checked over as per service or VHC (no parts replaced) The MOT is a minimum standard required, MOT doesnt check is brake fluid was replaced as per schedule, or cam belt changed etc etc. Would you want your wife or your mother driving a car that has play in the track rod ends, ball joints etc, tyres worn on edges, all of these if not excessive will pass MOT, I dont think the MOT is worth the paper its written on.

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  10. I agree. We always do the MoT first, firstly as a benefit to the customer as the MoT will highlight things a service wouldn’t necessarily cover and secondly it keeps, as a few have already said, the statistics correct because if vehicles were serviced before an MoT the pass rate would be higher and this would give a false impression that cars were in a better condition than they actually are so would fuel the 4-2-2 scenario which we absolutely do not want.

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  11. The idea is that a yearly MOT is to monitor the condition of vehicles used on the road, If you service a car first then it will pass an MOT, (If it fails then it’s not been serviced correctly) DVSA won’t have the correct data of vehicles on the roads before they’re serviced

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  12. I recall going back some 20 years when I worked on Commercials, Vosa then stopped doing pre-mot tests as they said it cheated the system, A company would have a 100% pass rate because the mechanics would do any repairs found on the pre-test and then present them for an MOT.

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  13. I agree

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  14. I also agree that the MOT test should be carried out before any service work. In addition to the reasons of showing ‘true’ MOT test results for the statistics I feel it also allows us to give our customers good customer service. We have a full-time MOT tester (who doesn’t do any other work) with a separate service workshop. By testing first, once the car has gone in for the service and we have carried out our additional checks we can then contact our customer with a full list of the work required, and the costs involved before going any further. They can then decide if they want to attend to everything at once, or postpone some of the costs by only having what they consider as the essential work done at this time.

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  15. I run a busy MOT Station and was paid a vist by VOSA they asked me a number of questions regarding vehicles that were in the work shop at the time, Of which “are you doing a service and MOT on this car?” to which I repled “Yes” VOSA then told me to make sure the MOT test is done before the service I asked why this car comes to my workshop all the time its a regular customer?
    VOSA told me regardless of the vehicle maintenance a true pass or fail of the vehicle is expected at the time of test which is then recorded on the data base so VOSA can see how reliable or not the make and model is for their records.

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  16. Test first because I don’t miss things I’m that good at my job and because I’ve allready checked it they Don’t have to do it inspect thing’s in the workshop

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  17. Alastair, Yes we do the same at our garage.

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  18. I disagree.
    Doing MOT first is likely your car will fail in MOT. When you are selling your car buyer will check MOT. If there are records of MOT failing every year buyer is unlikely to buy the car.

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  19. I agree with mot first, however the majority of customers assume the car is then fine for a further years motoring,some intend to get the service done after next pay day(never happens),its up to us to educate them, something which is becoming increasingly difficult with the cost of living crisis.

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  20. I always m.o.t the car first. What’s the point in changing the filters, spark plugs and the oil etc., if the owner can’t drive it because the subframe is rotten ?. Raj’s view is a bit short sighted and hints at some dodgy practices to sell cars.

    Reply

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